Fables and Myths

January 23, 2017

Our Pathways English class has been an exciting one. Last semester, we spent time on one of our more fun units: fables. We read about Aesop and studied many of his fables, and the students enjoyed putting the morals of the stories into their own words. We went on to study some more complex fables by Leo Tolstoy, the Ojibwa people, and Philippe and Pierre Marcelin, and we practiced finding the life-lesson in a story even when it is not plainly stated, like it is in the Aesop fables.

After our unit on fables, we shifted to a novel study; we read Hatchet, by Gary Paulsen. The story is about a young boy who is the lone survivor of a plane crash in the Canadian wilderness. We experienced hunger, fear, mosquito swarms, and many other challenges with the boy as we read the novel. We also learned how important something like fire can be in a survival situation, and just how versatile a hatchet is.

Now we are studying myths, beginning with Greek myths such as “Prometheus,” a myth about the creation of animals, humans, and fire, and “Demeter and Persephone,” a myth told to explain the changing of the seasons. The students have enjoyed examining the characters of these stories, especially the gods, goddesses, and heroes, and they have enjoyed piecing together the Greek mythological family tree.

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